The whole thing has been like a nightmare.
What happened?
Why was I not informed that he was ill?”
He watched me carefully, he did not take his eyes from my face.
“Your cousin’s death was sudden too,” he said, “it was a great shock to us all.
He had been ill, yes, but not, as we thought, dangerously so.
The usual fever that attacks many foreigners here in the summer had brought about a certain weakness, and he complained too of a violent headache.
The contessa—I should say Mrs. Ashley—was much concerned, but he was not an easy patient.
He took an instant dislike to our doctors, for what reason it was hard to discover.
Every day Mrs. Ashley hoped for some improvement, and certainly she had no desire to make you and his friends in England anxious.”
“But we were anxious,” I said, “that was why I came to Florence.
I received these letters from him.”
It was a bold move perhaps, and reckless, but I did not care.
I handed across the table the two last letters Ambrose had written me.
He read them carefully.
His expression did not change.
Then he passed them back to me.
“Yes,” he said, his voice quite calm, without surprise, “Mrs. Ashley feared he might have written something of the sort.
It was not until those last weeks, when he became so secretive and strange, that the doctors feared the worst, and warned her.”
“Warned her?” I said.
“Warned her of what?”
“That there might be something pressing on his brain,” he answered, “a tumor, or growth, of rapidly increasing size, which would account for his condition.”
A lost feeling came over me.
A tumor?
Then my godfather’s surmise was right after all.
First uncle Philip, and then Ambrose. And yet… Why did this Italian watch my eyes?
“Did the doctors say that it was a tumor that killed him?”
“Unquestionably,” he answered.
“That, and a certain flare-up of after-fever weakness.
There were two doctors present.
My own, and another.
I can send for them, and you can ask any question you care to put.
One speaks a little English.”
“No,” I said slowly, “no, it is not necessary.”
He opened a drawer and pulled out a piece of paper.
“I have here a copy of the certificate of death,” he said, “signed by them both.
Read it.
One copy has already been posted to you in Cornwall, and a second to the trustee of your cousin’s will, Mr. Nicholas Kendall, near Lostwithiel, in Cornwall.”
I looked down at the certificate. I did not bother to read it.
“How did you know,” I asked, “that Nicholas Kendall is trustee to my cousin’s will?”
“Because your cousin Ambrose had a copy of the will with him,” replied Signor Rainaldi.
“I read it many times.”
“You read my cousin’s will?” I asked, incredulous.
“Naturally,” he replied.
“As trustee myself to the contessa, to Mrs. Ashley, it was my business to see her husband’s will.
There is nothing strange about it.
Your cousin showed me the will himself, soon after they were married.
I have a copy of it, in fact.
But it is not my business to show it to you.
It is the business of your guardian, Mr. Kendall.